


White Sheets Just Make the Blood Darker

by AmazingGracesPouringDown



Category: One Piece
Genre: Angst, Death, Sad, Sanji gets hurt, Zeff and Sanji angst, Zeff and Sanji’s father-son relationship, Zeff is upset, Zoro and Luffy are pissed because they couldn’t do anything, sanji dies
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-07-27
Updated: 2020-07-27
Packaged: 2021-03-05 01:29:04
Rating: Not Rated
Warnings: Graphic Depictions Of Violence, Major Character Death
Chapters: 1
Words: 979
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25236214
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/AmazingGracesPouringDown/pseuds/AmazingGracesPouringDown
Summary: Zeff felt the floor disappear from underneath his legs. His heart is sitting like a stone in his chest and he can hardly tell if it’s beating or not. He could care less, to be honest. If his heart stopping was the result of what he was seeing, then so be it.His Little Eggplant is under a white sheet.What use is a beating heart to him now? What use was anything. Sanji was gone. Zeff failed.
Kudos: 14





	White Sheets Just Make the Blood Darker

Zeff opens his eyes and finds himself aboard the Going Merry. The ship was vaguely familiar and he knows he should be somewhere else, should be anywhere else. This ship is on the Grand Line, Zeff was supposed to be at the Baratie. The dinner rush is the most busy time of the day and Zeff _knows_ the kitchen needs his help. He turns around to ask a question, but he forgets what he was even questioning.   
  
He hears noise from the door to his left and he suddenly finds himself in front of it. Zeff opens the door like it will break, creaking as if no one opened it for years. The room was dark and no one was there. It was just a black abyss and it was staring Zeff in the face. The air was suddenly chilled well below freezing, Zeff shivered and opened the door fully. 

He finds himself face to face with the Chore Boy, the signature straw hat missing from his head. Instead of saying something he would usually, Zeff asks,

”Where is he?”

Luffy bowed his head then. Zeff understands the excuse for what it is and feels anger swell up in his gut, but before he could yell at the boy in front of him he was face to face with Zoro. The captain made a small noise and brought a hand up to his mouth. Zeff watched Zoro place a tight gripped hand on the smaller shoulder. 

“Listen, Old Man. He’s not-”

“ _Where is Sanji?”_

Zoro sighed at the chefs growl. He then turned and stepped to the side to reveal the rest of the room.

Zeff felt the floor disappear from underneath his legs. His heart is sitting like a stone in his chest and he can hardly tell if it’s beating or not. He could care less, to be honest. If his heart stopping was the result of what he was seeing, then so be it. 

His Little Eggplant is under a white sheet.

What use is a beating heart to him now? What use was anything. Sanji was gone. Zeff failed. The boy he tried to protect and save was gone, there’s no fixing this. None at all.

Zeff isn’t aware of the room slowly dissolving down into just him and the body under the sheet. _Sanji, under the sheet._ He slowly approaches the bed and feels heavy breath getting stuck in his throat, Zeff can’t feel the tears dripping off his chin. He only feels the nothingness around him.   
  


The old captain leans over the head of the bed, Sanji’s head outlined perfectly, and pulls the sheet off. Suddenly he sees his child and the black bruises covering his face. It breaks him that much more. Blue eyes are hidden behind bruised lids and his pale lips were still covered in blood, but Zeff feels his stomach turn at a wound on his neck. There is nothing in the world that can make Zeff’s stomach stop rolling with fear. The little Eggplant had his throat slit, and - by the looks of it- was beaten heavily as well. Blood long since dried is blooming in patches all along the length of the sheet, extremely heavy and dark at both the young cooks stomach and shoulders. Zeff can’t help but think that the white sheet really doesn’t hide much from the people Sanji left behind. It simply makes the blood seem darker and drives home the fact that Sanji _won’t ever bleed again._

Zeff places his hand on the mess of dulled blonde hair at Sanji’s brow and pushed the bangs back. The chef gazed upon a bloodless, emotionless face and wondered if he was looking at a real person. The nearly translucent pallor of the younger mans skin made him seem almost waxy. Zeff knew better.

Zeff knew death intimately, and death just ripped his life away from him. It ended Zeff’s life at the same time it ended Sanji’s.

” **Owner Zeff!** ” 

There was nothing now. Zeff can’t even see Sanji in the blackness that completely envelopes his vision. There is no sound besides a faint voice calling him.

“ **Head Chef!** ”

He tried looking for the source and found only inky darkness. The voices kept getting louder and louder, swimming around him at various speeds and Zeff can hardly keep up. He feels anxiety bubble up in his throat and fear starts to choke him. Overwhelming darkness creeps slowly, consuming him and all his thoughts and he fears there’ll be nothing left of him when it’s done. Not that he minds at all. He’s lost everything. There is nothing. Only death.

” _Shitty Geezer.”_

Zeff spins around so fast his heels almost collapse beneath him. Sanji is standing a short distance away, a lot cigarette in his mouth.   
  


“Wake up, Zeff.”

Zeff took one breath to say something and then he opens his eyes. Patty is standing above him, Carne a few feet away.   
  


“Owner Zeff, you hit your head pretty hard when that pirate broke the door down.... are you okay?”   
  


Zeff looked around slowly, taking in the Baratie dinning room and it’s inhabitants. 

Just as he left it. He rubbed his head and glanced around, a lingering feeling of anxiousness evaporates as he sees the state of his front doors. The pirate in question standing menacingly at the threshold.

Zeff never kicked anyone so far before, Patty and Carne laughed hysterically at the twinkle in the sky when the man so kindly ‘departed’.

Zeff swiftly turned on his heel with a gruff “Get your asses back to work. I have a door to fix.”

”Yes, Head Chef!”

Zeff wondered briefly what had gotten him so worked up while unconscious, he had a moment of clarity before waking, but now the old chef forgot what had bothered him so.

Oh well.

He had a store to run.


End file.
